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Monday, June 02, 2014

Last One For a While

I look at my bank balance, and I read this chronicle of my leisure time, and it makes me sad. I have seen far more movies at this point in the year than I have at this time last year. And all these weekend trips into the city are starting to make a serious impact on my savings. So I think I'm going to have to impose a moratorium on going to see movies. It's just starting to become unaffordable.

But, much like a dieter who has one last day with all their favourite foods before starting the diet, I knew there was one last movie I had to see before swearing off the movies for a while: X-Men: Days of Future Past.

It began like most days. Up at the crack of dawn, a leisurely breakfast, and then hitting the road. I do like driving. As I said in a previous podcast, if I ever win the lottery, I'll probably take a month off work and just drive. And driving early in the morning is the best. Clear skies, empty roads, just go. No side stops on this trip. I knew I'd be heading straight to West Edmonton Mall, catching the movie, and then coming home.

Although, as I remarked to friends, I was on the fence when it came to seeing X-Men in the city, or in the small town, one-screen theatre in the neighboring town of Barrhead. I'd been wanting to sample it for a while. But, ultimately, tradition won out. I've seen every X-Men movie in West Edmonton Mall, and darn it, that's the way it shall continue. The first and only midnight screening I've ever been to was for the first X-Men, and that was at West Edmonton Mall.

Didn't do much browsing in the Mall before the movie. It had been two weeks since I was last there to see Godzilla, so I didn't really think there'd been much new since then. However, while browsing in HMV, I did succumb and buy a new album. As I've already mentioned several times, I was pleasantly surprised by Wreck-It Ralph and how much I enjoyed it, so when I saw the soundtrack album at a decent price, I couldn't help but snatch it up.

Entering the ol' Scotiabank Theatre in West Edmonton Mall, I was a little bit turned around, as it's currently undergoing renovations. I can hardly believe it's been a part of the Mall for 15 years now. I remember being there in Y2K for that midnight screening of X-Men. The theatre had only been open for a year at that point, and to a few of my friends, it was the first time they'd been treated to the animatronic fire-breathing dragon, and the giant Batman and Yoda hanging from the ceiling. Back then, I was still in awe of all the glitz, but my friends weren't. "Too Vegas," I remember one commenting.

So. X-Men: Days of Future Past. I quite enjoyed it. Based on the classic X-Men story of the same name. In a nightmarish future, humanity is ruled by the Sentinels...giant, mutant-hunting robots. The remnants of the X-Men and Magneto's Brotherhood form the resistance. With time running out, they come up with a desperate plan. The nightmare of the Sentinels came about in 1973, when Mystique assassinated Bolivar Trask, the inventor of the Sentinels. This made Trask a martyr for the cause, and thus the Sentinels were pressed into action. Our heroes have developed a method for time travel. They want to send Wolverine back in time to 1973, unite the younger Professor X and Magneto, and present a united front to stop Mystique. Will the plan succeed?

The film continues to explore the Professor X/Magneto/Mystique trinity that they started in First Class. The way I see it, Mystique has become Darth Vader. Magneto is the Emperor, seducing her to the Dark Side, and Professor X is Obi-Wan Kenobi, trying to pull her back from the edge.

And I loved the scenes in the future. Bryan Singer has said that he considered The Terminator one of the best time travel films ever made, and that The Terminator was his model to follow. He says he even had a nice, 2-hour lunch with James Cameron where he picked Cameron's brain about time travel in the movies. And in all the future scenes, you can feel The Terminator's influence.

Quicksilver. Dear God, Quicksilver. I hope DC finally gets their act together and makes a Flash movie, because that's exactly how you depict superspeed. And as a friend pointed out, it's become so rare to see a character who actually enjoys their superpowers and has fun with them. And Quicksilver definitely has fun.

And the final scene. I don't want to say too much, but I will say it's a cameo-palooza.

Not much to hate about this. As one friend pointed out, the music score is kind of bland, and it seems this franchise has always been cursed with bland music. That being said, when the orchestra struck up with John Ottman's X-Men theme, I was thrilled to hear it again. Ottman also did the music for X2, and as far as I'm concerned, his X-Men theme was the only one that was any damn good. (Skip to 2:15 to hear the theme I'm talking about.)

And that's it. My money-saving, movie-free summer can now begin. It shouldn't be to tough, as there's really nothing on my radar until Guardians of the Galaxy comes out in August. "But what about Transformers: Age of Extinction?" you're probably asking. Well...I think I'm getting burnt out on Transformers. Granted, I got excited when I first saw the Dinobots in the Super Bowl spot, but everything else I've seen since then has me going, "Eh, what else ya got?" So I think it's time I take a break from Transformers.